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‘Why don’t you come for dinner later? Anna’s making tofu goreng. Jody’s coming home. It smells pretty good in here. All right?’
It was three o’clock in the afternoon. I would act out my conclusion. Come home half-formed, tail dragging: free.
‘Myra ... ’
‘Yeah?’
‘Who’s Anna?’
‘My father’s slave.’
§
The Y-shaped gold handle on Room 303 was stuck. It had a safety pin sticking out of the centre. It wouldn’t open for me. I banged on the door.
Gayl answered. She was alert, her shoulders pinned to her back, her back straight.
‘Sunny,’ she said, eyeing me. ‘’Tis a brand-new day.’
I had two thousand dollars in my pocket. ‘It is, yeah.’
I walked in past her. Gayl watched me. She could tell I was confident.
‘You heal pretty good,’ she said, shutting the door and pressing her body up against it.
Anna had served me cup after cup of tea while I wrote. She kept knocking like a little bird on my bedroom door. I kept thanking her and thanking her, saying, no more! That’s enough! Thank you, Anna! Now only my left cheek was still puffy. My eyes had a yellowish-violet tint around them. That’s all.
‘To tell you the truth,’ Gayl said, ‘I’m surprised we’re even fucking seeing you again.’
Gayl’s eyes were as bruised as the day before. She sat down at the table where there was an opened can of kidney beans.
‘Yeah? Well, don’t be surprised,’ I said. I felt tall in my body. I pushed out my chest and smiled. I felt excited to be with her. I was here, consciously, loaded with cash and the desire not to conceal violence. I had concluded my thinking on the slave.
‘Men don’t like to see the marks they make,’ Gayl said.
‘Oh no?’ I smiled.
Gayl smiled back at me. I think we both had the same thought: sometimes everyone wants to see what they’ve done.
‘Where’s Elijah?’ I asked.
‘Elijah is gone.’
‘Where?’
‘You don’t know?’
I got nervous all of a sudden. Where was he? I wanted the three of us. I wanted our porn.
Gayl stared at me. She made a pulse start in my cheek.
I fiddled around in my purse for my stash. I had only enough for one joint. But there was a perfect little pebble of hash stuck to some papers at the bottom of my bag. Aaron must’ve slipped it to me at some point without me knowing.
‘You think that’s going to make it better?’ Gayl asked.
‘I hope it’s still good,’ I said quickly, passing her the hash. ‘It’s been in my purse for a while.’
Gayl turned on the hot plate. She shoved a butter knife between the coils. The curtains were open. Bronze squares flashed into the room. I thought of dinner with Lee and Anna, my dad, Jody and Jeff. It would be better than Gayl’s kidney beans. I imagined her around our table too.
